Filed under: Multimedia
16 month-old bug continues to crash Flash
Matthew Dempsky has discovered a bug which will crash the Flash player on every supported platform. That might not seem like a huge deal, except that he discovered this bug in September of 2008 and has reported it to Adobe, which hasn't fixed it yet.16 months later.
If you'd like to test it for yourself, make sure there's nothing important open in your browser window and head to http://flashcrash.dempsky.org/.
In Safari and Google Chrome, this crashes the plugin but not the browser. It took Firefox 3.6 down entirely.
Why would Matthew post such a page? Isn't that reckless? Well, he explains on that page:
"Regarding crashing, I can tell you that we don't ship Flash with any known crash bugs, and if there was such a widespread problem historically Flash could not have achieved its wide use today," Lynch wrote. "Addressing crash issues is a top priority in the engineering team, and currently there are open reports we are researching in Flash Player 10." (Source: PC Mag, "Adobe Defends Flash, Calls Apple Uncooperative")
He goes on to say:
This page exploits a bug that I reported to Adobe in September 2008, and has affected every release of Flash on every platform since then. Despite numerous email exchanges with the Flash product manager about the bug, the bug report being hidden from the public for "security" reasons, and [although] Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch's claims otherwise, it continues to be an issue.
...I'm not an Apple fan boy out to prove Steve Jobs right in Apple's decision not to support Flash on the iPhone / iPad. Instead, I'm just a software engineer who at one time had to deal with Adobe's sorry excuse for a development platform and made an earnest effort on several occasions at helping them improve it for everyone. (This issue is merely the tip of the iceberg of ridiculous bugs and random backwards and forwards incompatibilities known as Adobe's Flash Player plug-in.) After trying to work with them to fix this issue and experiencing nothing but frustration, I just don't give a damn anymore.
Adobe has been able to rest on its laurels with Flash, because it was a de facto standard. Now that the platform is being left behind by new mobile devices and computing metaphors, Adobe is making an appeal to the public that Flash isn't that bad.
Adobe's been able to do much the same with Photoshop and CS4. Even people who love the apps and use them every day have learned to live with the crashes and other problems. Adobe seemed not to be in too much of a rush to get Snow Leopard compatible versions out. Ditto for when Apple switched to Intel.
I'm amazed by people who continue to defend Flash, including those who believe that alternatives will have a chance if web developers weren't pushed to start using newer alternatives like H.264 and HTML 5. (No, I'm not saying H.264/HTML 5 is a drop-in replacement for Flash, and I'm not even going to mention SVG.)
If we all went with the "de facto standard" we'd be using Internet Explorer 6 on Windows. Actually, we'd probably be using Internet Explorer 4.
No doubt that Flash has done some great things. At one time, it was cutting edge stuff. Now it's a dull butter knife.
And I'd be remiss if I didn't remind you about ClickToFlash which I've reviewed previously.
(Hat tip to Craig Hockenberry and Mike Damm for bringing this story to our attention.)
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
Mars478 said 4:40PM on 2-06-2010
Does not crash my Safari 4.0.4 with Flash 10 Beta 2 on a MacBook Core duo.
Bug patched!
Reply
Chroma said 4:56PM on 2-06-2010
yep, same here.
Ark said 6:58PM on 2-06-2010
it hasnt crashed here yet either
IvanP91 said 5:00PM on 2-06-2010
doesnt matter. Flash should be removed anyway. Flash is slow, crapware, etc
Oh and crashed my MBP (bought in 2009) in Safari 4.0.4
Stupid flash, cant even be stable.
bayxsonic said 5:05PM on 2-06-2010
Yes, FF3.6, latest beta, didn't crash.
shineon said 6:03PM on 2-06-2010
You probably have 10.1 beta 2 correct because that is the version to have finally fixed the bug.
RyanR said 6:05PM on 2-06-2010
Patched? It crashed the plugin in Chrome (latest dev) on SL for me.
Fozzy Bear said 8:04PM on 2-06-2010
i don't consider 10.1 beta to be "patched" when the majority of users aren't using beta. Hence, the name.
balls said 10:51PM on 2-06-2010
@Fozzy
Uh, it is fixed, it's just a beta.
I don't know how you expect to go to old versions of flash and magically fix them.
sandfarmer said 2:29AM on 2-07-2010
Try this with FF 3.6 (Mac), Flash Player 10.0 and instant crash. So I hunted down the 10.1b2, installed it and rebooted just to be sure. Fired up FF and tried it again and nothing. No crash. BUT I am noticing that my machine rebooted fast than it normally does and FF is cruisin' now. FF is responding much faster than it has. I'm not sure but, Flash Player 10.0, as third party apps have in past OS's, may have not only had the crash bug, but has been bogging down my machine. It is so weird that coincidentally all of a sudden things across the board are moving quicker. I would not put it past the app causing problems. It would be the first time I have encountered something like this.
sandfarmer said 2:41AM on 2-07-2010
Please pardon my horrific typing. Just not as good as I use to be.
Tried this with . . .
. . . faster than it normally does . . .
. . . It wouldn't be the first time I have encountered something like this.
Nate said 4:51PM on 2-06-2010
Crashed FF and crash the flash plugin in Safari and Chrome but it didnt do anything to Opera 10.10 interesting...
Reply
IvanP91 said 4:56PM on 2-06-2010
Flash sucks completely. Why wont it die?! HTML5 May be finalized in 2022 but damn it its available NOW. So USE IT.
Apple should remove flash from Mac OS X entirely. Macs wont crash, making people like them more AND CRITICALLY IMPORTANT: will force news sources, and other websites to use HTML5 and flash-crap alternative.
Removing and dropping of flash entirely will increase Macs' market share because they will be known for their superior quality and for being crash-less without flash-crap
HTML5 Forever!!!!!!!!
Reply
RyanR said 6:07PM on 2-06-2010
While I also dislike Flash I'd like to now how you came to the conclusion HTML5 was an appropriate replacement? The two are very different doing very different things.
If Flash is terrible then don't install it.
Jorgie said 7:09PM on 2-06-2010
I am confused, why does everyone keep saying HTML5 takes care of it and we don't need flash any more?
1. HTML5 is not here yet
2. HTML5 only takes care of video not all the games / software written in flash
You are the same obliviots that claim that Open GL can be used in place of Direct X.. it is an apples to oranges comparison and makes not sense.
Eric said 8:59PM on 2-06-2010
Yeah... shipping computers that can't play YouTube videos will definitely make more people buy Apple products. Maybe they should take Safari and Mail out of OS X too.
Tom said 10:31PM on 2-06-2010
"I am confused, why does everyone keep saying HTML5 takes care of it and we don't need flash any more?"
Because HTML5 does more then just play video. With a combination of HTML 5, CSS 3, Javascript, and SVG, developers could do the same thing as they can with Flash. And companies like Apple can optimize for it. Flash is closed, only allowing Adobe to make it run better. HTML/CSS/JS/SVG are open standards, allowing anyone to make a better parser.
The same as OpenGL + OpenAL + other tech being capable of doing everything Direct X does.
IvanP91 said 11:05PM on 2-06-2010
@Tom thanks for the info man. :)
macserv said 5:22PM on 2-07-2010
Don't forget the element. Combined with HTML5 Video/Audio and Javascript, we'll soon be wondering why we ever used a non-standard solution for this stuff.
Here's a taste... no flash here; all HTML5 and ...
http://9elements.com/io/projects/html5/canvas/
What we WILL need (and what Adobe is best equipped to provide) are first-class authoring tools for the new medium. This is the direction in which the "Flash" suite should evolve.
macserv said 5:27PM on 2-07-2010
More demos here, too:
http://open.adaptedstudio.com/html5/